


Tomorrow Belonged To Me

by abaddon (nothingbutfic)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-27
Updated: 2017-10-27
Packaged: 2019-01-23 23:21:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12518920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nothingbutfic/pseuds/abaddon
Summary: All good things come to an end.





	Tomorrow Belonged To Me

**Author's Note:**

> Written after HBP, but not completely AU for HBP.

  
Draco Malfoy walks along the streets of London, and keeps himself alert. Around him, one wrought iron fence fades one into another; large Victorian houses loom up out of the pouring rain and then disappear again into the grey. It is pissing down; and he is wet, sodden through from hair to his boots, and he can’t be bothered to do anything else than squelch.

Because it’s London, and it rains in London; he even seems to breathe it, air thick with it, and although it’s dismal and depressing and dour, it is home. The War is over, has been over for at least a few weeks now; what fear does he have of simple rain?

There’s a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye; Draco does not acknowledge it - that would be giving the game away, and he’s lived too long and stayed too safe to be considered a complete fool. A partial fool, he muses to himself, with a wry amused snort, and doesn’t break his stride as he continues to walk leisurely down the street. He knows what he can handle, and what he cannot, and if whatever-this-is turns out to be the latter, well, there’s not much point in hurrying.

His fingers twitch just a little, and as he turns the corner, his wand is out and ready with a practiced ease that has come of many times practicing in front of the mirror, and more than the odd bit of paranoia.

Draco recognises the figure standing in the downpour instantly, and feels quite surprised. He didn’t expect this, and scowls just a little, before that vanishes from his face with a deliberate effort. He doesn’t want to do this; not here, not now, not ever. It makes him feel like a schoolboy all over again, and memories bubble to the surface of his mind - memories he doesn’t want to contemplate, failures he doesn’t want to consider.

“Potter,” he greets the other man, and doesn’t lower his wand for a second. “What an unexpected pleasure. Do you want me to break your nose again?”

Potter laughs at him, grins as the water runs down his face. “Draco. Good to see you still have that temper.”

“Idiocy always brings it to the fore.”

“Why were you laughing before? I thought I heard you chuckle.”

“Oh, that?” Draco considers his reasons and if it’s worth the bother of lying. Or responding. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it, Potter. I wouldn’t want you to strain anything.”

“I always knew you thought I was pretty.”

“Oh, bugger off. I haven’t got time for this.” Draco strides forward, lowering his wand, and doesn’t give a fuck about the consequences: he knows he can take Potter, after all. Potter’s expression is typically inscrutable, and he simply moves a few paces to the left to block Draco’s advance, and they are so close Draco can see the small puffs of steam Potter’s breath makes in the air.

“I can remember when you would have been desperate for the chance to take me down,” Potter tells him, voice low and deliberately so, Draco thinks, curling into his mind like poison.

“Yes, well, I moved onto bigger and better things, didn’t I?” Draco affects a deliberate pose of boredom, and doesn’t look at him. “Trying to stay alive was a bit of a priority, I’m afraid. So sorry to disappoint.” He pauses, and allows himself to smirk, and that is honest and he feels it. “Besides, I beat you,” he murmurs, leaning in to gloat in Potter’s face. “I didn’t need to do it again.” His wand comes out and up and jabs Potter in the ribs, makes his breath hitch in a way that’s rather satisfying, and Draco’s face and voice harden into steel. “Now get out of my fucking way.”

“Or what, you’ll kill me? No.”

“Merlin, but you’re petty.” Draco’s hand reaches out to grab Potter by his robes and pushes him away a few paces just to be rid of the closeness for a time.

“This from the kid who made up songs to taunt people with. I never realised you had such musical ability.”

“It was a good song!” Draco yells, and he shouldn’t be reduced to this. “And I am not a kid anymore. Haven’t you got better things to do than stalk me?”

“I thought I’d get some stalking tips from the past master.”

Draco rolls his eyes. “That joke is so very old. I’ve grown up, Potter. Moved on. You should do the same.”

“You’re still the same boy I remember from Madam Malkin’s,” Potter tells him. “Besides, nothing really changes. History just repeats itself.” He sighs, running fingers through damp hair plastered to his head, and seems smaller than Draco remembers. Insignificant. “Nothing really changes. Not even us, not even when we want it to.”

“Not even Potter and Malfoy?”

Potter’s answering grin is about as crooked as his morality. “Not by half.”

“War’s over, Potter, you won. Now go away. Thanks to you we can all live free and happy little lives, men and house elves all, and I’d like to be free of you-”

“You’ll never be free of me,” Potter mutters under his breath, but Draco chooses not to hear it.

“-Everyone’s celebrating. Practically dancing in the streets.”

“Yes, I’m sure you’re ready for a brand new beat,” Potter comments, and Draco, who doesn’t get the reference, wants to punch him, and does, fist straight in the jaw as he storms forward and past him.

“Ow! What’d you do that for?” Potter yelps, and hurries to catch up with him, cradling his face.

When Draco whirls on him, he can feel the anger raging through his body, finger shaking as it points at Potter’s face like a weapon. “Because I have lived the past four years of my life without being in your shadow, Potter, and I am quite content for it to stay that way.”

“Call me Harry, for Christ’s sake. You were the first real wizard I ever met, you know. Hagrid was my friend, but you were the world. What I placed myself in opposition to. You were the beginning; we were the beginning, you and I. Doesn’t seem so odd now, that you’re here, at the end.”

Despite himself, Draco is intrigued and more than a little scared. “...The end?”

Potter - Harry - strides a little quicker to get ahead of him, turns and blocks his progress one more time. Draco stops in front of him and lets it happen, lets Harry reach out with one hand and squeeze his shoulder, sees the tiredness in his face, the way his shoulders slump, and wonders briefly why he was ever frightened of this man. “I need your help, Draco.”

Draco smiles. “...I always thought that would be the other way around, you know.”

Harry smiles back, and it’s tired still, but true. “So did I. How many times did you try and beat me to show off?”

Draco takes a step backwards, feeling suddenly embarassed by the boy he was and probably ever more shall be. “I wanted you to be my enemy.”

“Big whoop. My enemies, like my friends, usually end up dead. You should have just jumped in the lake; it would have been kinder.”

“You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies,” Draco grumbles, and doesn’t like the sound of his own protestation, or the way Harry’s hand moves briefly to run up and down his arm, as if they were some kind of friends. Perhaps they are, he reflects after a brief pause; perhaps they’ve known each other too long and fought too hard and wasted too much time to be anything but. He glances up, and finds Harry looking at him wryly.

“What?”

“If you can judge a man by the quality of his enemies, God, I must be pretty damn fantastic,” Harry muses, lips on the verge of a grin, and before Draco knows it, they’re both chuckling, then laughing, so hard and hysterical that it shakes the both of them, tears running down their faces - not that it can be seen in the rain, but Draco knows they’re there - and then the sun bursts out from behind the clouds and a rainbow shimmers into existence overhead as the rain finally stops.

Draco’s laughter finally subsides, and he glances over at Harry who’s grinning the grin of a man who thinks he knows something Draco doesn’t, and just for that Draco jabs him in the ribs with his wand and gets another yelp. “What’d you do that for?”

“Because I could.”

“Don’t make me hurt you.”

“What are you going to do,” Draco sneers, “ _drip_ on me?”

“You little shit!” Harry yells, and throws a punch, but Draco is shorter and quicker and knows how to dart away. They run round the streets of London like teenagers, giddy and merry and high before Draco gets a stitch and has to stop, doubled over and panting.

“...You’re not very fit, are you?” muses an observant voice just off to the side, and Harry Potter leans against a tree, arms crossed over his chest.

“Oh, shut it,” Draco snarls.

“Or what, you’ll have me?”

“Don’t piss off people who you’ve asked for help. It’s not exactly wise.”

“I never said I was very wise.”

“I don’t think anyone could.” Draco catches his breath, straightens, and winces as he does, hand going to his back.

“Don’t tell me you’ve pulled something.”

“Old injury. A particularly nasty hex a year or two back.”

Harry moves around as he hobbles closer, and pulls Draco’s jacket and shirt up, hands warm against chilled skin.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Draco demands to know, and makes an effort to struggle. Harry just holds onto his shoulder with one hand as the fingers of his other trace the scar left behind by Dolohov, and shushes him.

“I’m examining your injury. Be a grateful chap and shut the fuck up.”

“It tickles!”

“...You are such a nancy boy,” Harry announces, and lets the clothing drop back down. Draco takes a few seconds to tuck it back in, and turns on him, furious.

“I didn’t ask you to sodding manhandle me! You’re definitely pushing your luck, Potter-”

Whatever he has to say is halted by Harry reaching around to pull Draco close in his arms, and silences him with a kiss that is deep and lingering, tongue sliding between Draco’s lips to silence him and steal his voice.

“...Come help me save the world, Draco.”

Draco laughs, bitterly, but doesn’t break free. “You still think after all these years you’re God’s gift, and that we should all just follow along like puppies at heel.”

“I need your help.”

“So you _said_.”

“You really don’t want to be a part of this? Nothing ever really changes, Draco.”

Draco sighs against Harry’s hair. “Not even us.”

“ _Especially_ not us,” Harry breathes, and Draco’s glad he can’t see Harry’s expression. He sounds sad and sorry enough for the both of them; clearly Draco’s going to have to be the strong one here, and disentangles himself from Harry’s arms.

“Alright then,” he says, brisk and snide. “Let’s go be _heroes_. I always knew you had a complex.”

Harry laughs. It’s a start. “You don’t know the half of it.”

“I suppose you’re going to enlighten me.”

“Makes it slightly difficult to save the world when you don’t know what you’re doing.”

Draco glances over at him as they walk along the streets of London, small smirk on his face, and if Harry shows any sign of acknowledging it, it’s hard to tell. “You always managed.”

“Like I didn’t see that one coming,” breezes Harry, and leads him over concrete and under arch and by bridge and past house and street and embankment. Harry seems to know where they’re going – where he’s leading Draco, and for the moment, Draco is content to trust him.

“…If you get me lost, there will be consequences,” he warns, because he can.

“What, will you break my nose again?”

“I’d like to hope I could find something more original. Merlin forbid I repeat myself.”

Harry snorts, and grows a little more sober. As they walk, he tells Draco a story – of horcruxes, of immortality and split souls and eternity glimpsed in an hour or something else that reminds Draco of Blake, except there’s no satanic mills to be found in Southwark, and he always hated Blake anyway. They cross the street, and Harry at least remembers to look both ways before striding into a small park, the paths and grass still glistening from the rain.

In the distance a child busies himself on a roundabout, spinning and spinning until he squeals and giggles and his mother looks on with a mixture of fondness and concern. The world is quiet here; still, content, and so is Draco.

“He laughed at me, just before he died,” Harry says softly, and doesn’t glance away from the boy and his mother. “Just before I killed him. Told me he still wasn’t finished.”

“He always did like talking about himself.” Draco pauses. “I do hope you didn’t believe him. I mean, you fought the good fight. Destroyed all those horcruxes. Killed him until he was dead.”

“Mmm,” Harry replies absently. “Certainly did. Turns out though he did leave one bit of him behind. Not exactly in the same way a horcrux works, but then I was never very good at the theory. Still, there’s a bond. It is all about the bondage.”

Draco’s not stupid, and he can put two and two together and make four. “Shut up. You think this is funny?”

“No, but I have to laugh, don’t I?”

“Why come to _me_?” Draco’s annoyed and surprised to find how much his voice shakes.

“Because you’re Draco Malfoy. You always wanted to beat me, didn’t you?”

“And then I did. Like I said, I don’t need to do it again.”

“But you can, and who else can say that? You wanted to be my equal? Well, you are. There’s a certain responsibility that comes with power.”

“I don’t want to _kill_ you!” Draco yells, and places his hands against Harry’s chest, pushing him away violently. The child stops giggling for a moment and looks over at them – his mother is elsewhere now, and all he has in the park is them to watch over him; Draco feels oddly guilty for having disturbed his fun.

“And I don’t want to _die_. But he’s in me and I can’t get him out. It’s a bit of his soul; a bit of his self. Just as alive and potent and desperate as he ever was, and he wants to take over.”

“Don’t let him,” Draco pleads and curls his arms around Harry’s neck, and kisses him again, tasting all the sadness in the world on those lips.

“It helps to be here. You remind me of who I am. Who I was.”

Draco chuckles, and it’s strained and shows it. “What an honour. I would have thought that Weasley girl of yours had a more potent appeal to your sense of self.”

“Ginny. He liked her as well, you know. With her, I stopped being sure where he began and I ended, and then.” Harry swallows and leans into Draco just a little more, and Draco cradles him in his arms the way he probably shouldn’t and always wanted to. “I woke up last week in our home and she was dead on the sheets next to me and there was so much blood everywhere.”

Draco closes his eyes.

“I never knew there could be so much blood in a person,” Harry breathes, sounding as though he’s still working it out for himself, and pulls away, hands sliding down Draco’s arms to grasp his wrists.

“You have to do this for me.”

“I don’t want to.”

“Which is why I’m asking you and not someone else.”

“I _won’t_.” If Draco felt stamping his foot wasn’t completely absurd considering the circumstances, he would. But then, really, considering the circumstances, virtually everything is completely absurd.

“Don’t be stupid.”

“I won’t! I won’t I won’t I won’t!” He does, indeed, stamp his foot. Harry raises his eyebrow and chooses not to comment; it’s a wise choice.

“Are you a coward? Afraid I’ll beat you one last time?”

“I’m not afraid of anything, especially not _you_ ,” Draco snarls, gritting his teeth and pulls out his wand to show he can. “I could kill you here and now if I wanted to. But that’s _my_ choice to make.”

“…I remember when you told Dumbledore the same thing.”

Draco looks at him in shock and horror; he can feel the colour drain from his face. “You were there.”

“I was there.”

“No wonder you think I’m a coward.”

“No, Draco,” Harry steps forward and grabs Draco’s wand in a hand, places the tip against his chest. “Not that. Never that.”

Draco breathes deeply. “Don’t ask me to do this.”

“You can do anything you want, remember? Sometimes heroes don’t get to do what they want, though.”

“I never should have signed that contract,” Draco muses, and makes himself smile.

“Yeah. The fine print is a bitch.”

“I’m going to miss you.”

“I know. It’s mutual. You were a worthy adversary, Draco.”

“If you keep taking the piss, I’ll step on your face again.”

“If it were that easy, I’d let you.” He pauses, then, and Draco can see tears glisten behind his glasses. “I don’t want this. I don’t want to die. But it has to end. It has to be finished.” His voice drops to a whisper, and a brief touch of red flashes in his eyes, a colour that Draco remembers and fears all too well. “I trust you, Draco. Finish this.”

Draco says two words. There’s a flash of green and a body falls to the wet grass. In the distance the child has stopped his play, and looks over at Draco with a gaze that is curious and unyielding.

He burns the body away to ash with an Incendio, and lets the ashes scatter across the park. In less than a minute, he's just changed the world. This is his power; this is his glory, and no-one will ever know and Draco wants it that way.

Draco brushes some ashes from the toe of his right shoe on the grass, and as he meets the stare with a guarded expression of his own, feeling numb and blank, he wonders what future that child will bring.  


[Subscribe](https://www.livejournal.com/subscribers/add?instant_relation=1&user=nothingbutfic&instant_relation_source=after_post)  



End file.
